Life After Top Chef Recap: Life Kicks You In The Aspen

Recaps

By CynTV | Wednesday, October 31, 2012 | 12:00 pm | 6 Comments
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Posted in: Life After Top Chef, Recaps

Jen is my homegirl from Philly, the most fabulous place on earth. Jen is a protégé of famed chef Eric Ripert, but apparently she didn’t listen to all his advice. Jen was all set to open a restaurant in Philly called Concrete Blonde, but her business partners pulled their investment because she wanted a little more equity in the business and they didn’t agree. Now Jen’s in restaurant limbo. Eric warned her, but Jen jumped the gun. Mentors are mentors for a reason!

No, not Mentos, mentors.

At a celebrity guest chef appearance at a friend’s restaurant in D.C., she creates a tasting menu of some of the food she’ll serve at Concrete Blonde. Um, her menu is strange. She’s serving Spanish rock octopus, rabbit ravioli, and olive oil sponge cake for dessert. Not exactly hometown food, Jen.

Cheesesteak + Pretzel = GENIUS.

Jen leaves Aspen to attend a wine and food festival in Charleston, then flies home and visits her parents. The upside to not opening a restaurant is that she can spend more time with her parents. Jen’s mom suffered a stroke and is paralyzed on her left side. She’s confined to her bed and Jen’s dad takes care of her full time. In spite of that, they are a loving and rather funny family. There is a very poignant scene where Jen takes her mom to the back deck so mom can practice walking.

Richard was the runner up of Season 4 and won Top Chef All Stars. He’s one of those “molecular gastronomy” chefs. I looked up the definition, and now my head hurts. It’s another upgraded reference – something about how when you mix two tastes together you get a new taste. Think of it as yellow + blue = green. New color!!

Molecular gastronomy at its finest. I think.

Richard also got into trouble when he “clashed with his previous investors over the menu”. Well, that was stupid. But Richard bounced back and is a partner and creative consultant in a modern hamburger restaurant called Flip Burger Boutique. It’s a little pretentious for me. No burger can be classified as “boutique”..

 

… unless you mean this.

Richard is juggling the opening of a new restaurant and his celebrity promotions with the demands of his beautiful wife and two children under 5, and he needs to be brilliant at both!! Not gonna happen, Richie. Not gonna happen. I tell you, the stress on his face melts through the screen. Writing about him is giving me a headache, so we’ll move on.

The quartet meets at the Aspen Food and Wine Festival, where our two Type A chefs, Jen and Richard, participate in many activities, Fabio markets his little butt off, and Spike gets other people to do his work, and schmoozes his way through the festival. There is a funny segment where 3 of the chefs participate in a 5K run. Richard criticizes his run, non-runner Jen muscles her way to the end, and Fabio manages to get his business partner to pull him in a wagon for the entire race. Richard calls him a media whore, but Fabio’s really media savvy. Where is Spike, you may ask?

You didn’t really think Spike was going to run, did you? 

Silly gasm-ites.

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CynTV
About

In the immortal words of No Doubt: I'm just a girl. I'm just a girl in the world. Hopefully. There's nothing I like better than mixing a fine cosmo, putting my feet up and laughing my ass off reading a Tvgasm recap. The reality is that the cosmo is actually a grape Kool Aid - but the rest of it is true!!

6 Comments

  1. 1
    gretchenbarney
    Posted October 31, 2012 at 4:53 pm

    Welcome CynTv! I’m so glad you are recapping this show. I adore Fabio, Richard, and Jenn but I have never thought much of Spike’s talents. This show has done nothing to change that. I have eaten at Flip Burger and it was very good. Very exciting to see the giant tank of … – going blank, whatever it was that he poured on everything to instantly freeze it. And fries with homemade mayo. Nothing wrong with that.

  2. 2
    Adelefig
    Posted November 1, 2012 at 2:56 am

    I cannot stand Jen! She has never demonstrated she is that talented of a chef, Most of the time she has a surly, bi#chy attitude and when she talks her mouth does something weird that bugs me…. whew…I have wanted to say that since All Stars when she flipped out at her elimination and embarrassed her former employer Eric Ripert! Wonder if her personality is why all her investors pulled out? Richard’s wife seems like she is barely tolerating him….I don’t give that marriage much longer….sad…

  3. 3
    Chicken Lips
    Posted November 1, 2012 at 9:26 am

    @Adelefig – I can’t stand the way she moves her mouth either. It’s like her jaw is permanently partially wired shut. Maybe that’s what makes her a pissy cranky witch.

    I have no interest in watching the show because I didn’t particularly care for any of these people (yes, even Fabio), but I’ll read the recaps because most times the recaps are about 75% better than the show anyway. =)

    I feel partially responsible for all of these new reality shows – I love my trashy reality TV so much, it just encourages these networks to grasp at anything they can claim would be a great reality show. So to the people that love reality and can’t get enough, you’re welcome. To the people that are believing that this whole “reality TV” thing is wearing a little thin, I’m sorry. And for the record, I’m on the “This is starting to get a little ridiculous” side. =)

  4. 4
    CynTV CynTV
    Posted November 1, 2012 at 11:06 am

    Thnk you for the welcome, Gretchen! I was a little paranoid that no one was reading my recap. But then I made myself a martini and felt much better. I have no doubt Flip Burger is good, but you can find a good burger in lots of places. Listen – my daughter introduced me last night to Chipotle Mexican, which is a very good, high priced Taco Bell. Adelefig – I know what you mean about her mouth – she has kind of a weird lisp thing going on. And I did see her temper tantrum. If I have someone as well- respected as Eric Ripert on my side, I’m not going to piss him off, you know? And what the hell is she making? Octopus? Olive oil sponge cake? Thanks for the compliment, ChickenLips. And we’re being saturated with reality TV for sure, but if we didn’t have that, we wouldn’t be doing much at Tvgasm!

  5. 5
    zerocool
    Posted November 1, 2012 at 4:43 pm

    Spike annoys me so much. The fact that he and Marcel are going to be on The Next Iron Chef competition is ridiculous. I figure they need some filler chefs to be eliminated first before the qualified chefs start to go. Because I have a soft spot in my heart for the little monkey (Marcel) I hope Spike goes home first.

    I was surprised to see how well together Fabio seems to be, and how bitchy Richard’s wife is. As for Jen, hope she gets her shit together and opens something.

    Thanks for recapping the show!

  6. 6
    Mummy Butterfly
    Posted November 2, 2012 at 8:05 am

    I love Fabio and Richard – always have. I think Richard doesn’t see how incredible he is, when he won Top Chef All Stars, it was truly like he knew he COULD win, but never thought he WOULD win. It’s an endearing mix of humility and sweetness. I just adore him.

    Fabio – ah, Fabio. He makes me laugh and just enjoy the TV. I love him and Carla. :D

    Jen annoys me. Yes, you can cook – stop being such a jerk.

    Spike? He’s funny at times, but without the charm of Fabio. I don’t dislike him, but I could do without.

    Should have had Carla on the show!

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